Total pages in book: 54
Estimated words: 49907 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 250(@200wpm)___ 200(@250wpm)___ 166(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 49907 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 250(@200wpm)___ 200(@250wpm)___ 166(@300wpm)
My sister and Ella were starting to see just how obsessive Wilder was. They’d always joked about it, teasing me over his intensity, but it was another thing entirely to witness it play out the way it was. While I didn’t want to give his actions any space in my mind, I couldn’t stop myself from reading between the lines of every note and each chosen bloom. It was as if he was speaking directly to me through them.
I didn’t miss their looks of concern when the flowers arrived, especially from my sister.
They didn’t say much, but I knew what they were thinking. After I got a little too overprotective, snapping at them for making it into a bigger deal than it was, I think they silently agreed to keep their opinions to themselves.
I didn’t mind the notes.
If I weren’t so fucking angry and hurt, I might’ve been a puddle on the floor reading them. That was the worst part—knowing that, despite everything, Wilder still had a hold on me. The cards were simple but devastating, the kind of obsessive, unhinged shit that left no doubt about what he thought.
"Every night without you feels like dying. Come home."
"You can block me, but you can’t run from me. You’re mine. Always."
"I would burn this city down to have you in my arms again. Say the word, Mint, and watch me do it."
One of them had been nothing more than a single sentence. "Tell me who to kill to fix this, and I’ll do it with a smile if it makes you happy."
Each time, I told myself to throw them out without reading, but I couldn’t because as much as they terrified me, they also made my heart twist in a sick, needy way I hated. The flowers were beautiful, of course. Wilder didn’t do anything half-assed. Roses, lilies, orchids—blooms I couldn’t even name, their meanings layered and deliberate. Once, he sent me a bouquet of asphodel and yarrow, which my sister had googled.
"Asphodel means eternal regret and yarrow is for healing wounds," she’d explained, her voice hesitant. "That’s… a lot."
Yeah. A lot.
That was Wilder, though.
Even in his silence, he was still finding ways to invade my life, leaving me reeling in the aftermath of him.
For fourteen days.
Fourteen fucking days.
It didn’t sound like much, just hours and seconds when you broke it down, but when it felt like part of you was missing, when the pain twisted itself into something physical, clawing at your chest, fourteen days was endless. Each second dragged, and each minute felt like a lifetime. Nights were the worst. The silence and the absence of his warmth were a constant reminder of everything I’d lost.
Part of me was relieved, thankful for the space to breathe and sort through the mess he’d made of me. Mostly, I was crushed. I hated the tiny voice in the back of my mind whispering that maybe I didn’t matter to him as much as he always claimed. It was relentless, eating away at the fragile pieces of my heart I was desperately trying to hold together. Every day had been a battle, a rollercoaster of hysterics, rage, and a sickening emptiness I couldn’t shake.
The anger kept me afloat, burning bright enough to drown out the hurt, but it was fleeting. Always so damn fleeting. I wasn’t sure what I would get out of this spontaneous vacation, but a change of scenery couldn’t hurt. Right?
The faint beep of the security system announced the front door opening, pulling me from my spiral. I didn’t think twice about it. Cherish had run out to grab ice for the coolers; she didn’t want to deal with it in the morning before we headed out. I backed out of the closet with a pair of sweatpants in hand, wondering what to match them with.
“Taking a trip without me?”
I yelped, my heart slamming against my ribs. Whipping around, my pulse thundered in my ears as my gaze landed on him.
“Wilder?”
He was leaning casually against the wall beside my now-closed bedroom door.
His eyes fixed on me with the unrelenting intensity that always stripped me bare. He looked infuriatingly perfect as if the last two weeks hadn’t gutted him the way they had me. He was so damn gorgeous this could have been an image in a men’s magazine. The smirk tugging at his lips was one I knew too well.
For a moment, I couldn’t move, couldn’t speak. The storm of questions that had haunted me every day since that night surged forward, demanding answers. I wasn’t sure I wanted them anymore. I certainly didn’t need them. Whatever answers he had would not be beneficial to me moving on. I was pretty certain they would just split me open all over again.
“You like the flowers?”
What a stupid, rhetorical question. I had been going out of my way to make them all live for as long as they could. He knew I liked flowers. There were four massive vases in my room. More were downstairs.